Best Audiophile desktop for under $2500?

Audiophile and PC are mutually exclusive.

yep

Oxymoron.

I'm using a mini Intel i5 PC running Volumio, connected via USB-C to an SMSL SU-10 DAC.  A 2TB external SSD drive contains all my music in FLAC, DSF, MP3 and OPUS formats, and Volumio provides access to my Qobuz subscription.  I think the comments about PC and audiophile being mutually exclusive are just borne of arrogance and self-importance and are, frankly, nonsense. 

Not arrogance, just expectations based upon generally accepted principles. In high end digital, the PC is well known to be noisy especially when sharing resources with other applications. That’s why dedicated audiophile streamers are common in our hobby.

@deanshias , yes and it's now called a PAN (Personal Area Network), although I've called it a TAN (Tiny AN); the name us 'ancients' used until wireless and bluetoothing made it almost irrelevant....  You do it anytime you USB an outboard drive to the box....  You can use a network cable 'twixt the 2 and the system will likely recognise what you've done.... 🤷‍♂️👍

There are No 'phile 'puters 'out there', anything for the gamers is geared for zero vid latency and 'twitch speed'; sound is 'surround' only to warn the player that there's Something Behind You, potentially deadly.

Btw, there are quiet fans....I can't hear the one in my 'audio only' diy, nor the ones' I use to cool my ss amps....just because....*S*  Go shopping, they're out there.

Audio 'puter =  a case that I've drug about with the same rack width as the main amp, 3 eq's, a mix/split, and 2 xovers (1 digital + 1 analog).

ASUS m/b, AMT R5, max'd RAM, half T SSD + 1T HD...vid card is mid-level, but sound card is ASUS Essence STX 2 with the 'break-out' card (the latter was hard to find, but found New, in box....👍).

Win10Pro with nothing else to do, single monitor.

And since they were sitting around, taking up space....

An HP, R5 AMT (slightly slower), max RAM, 1T hd, 2 screens, Win10Pro, runs only monitoring  of the audio main....at least it can accept cards and such, since it has a real MB....*75% 👍*L*

And the 2nd HP, R5 again, max Ram, 1T hd, 2 screens....work stuff and playback during that....opening it reveals a MB suited to a laptop with no card potential or much else....🤷‍♂️

On the other hand....I've got a server case that can be built to whatever I could consider rational, that could accept up to 5 drives....🤔

Cranky me, I don't buy OTS 'puters anymore...

More fun to diy what I want 'It' to do, duck the bloatware, go for clean speed and flex....add a DAC when I get one of those 'round2its'...;)

Noise?  What noise?  20's db....

Loudest thing is the space heater....