Ideas for my next DAC....?

Sounds like the Ayre QX5-20 would meet the OP’s requirements. Excellent sound to boot. 

Mytek Manhattan has all your features. I’ve had a couple of very highly rated 10k dacs recently and the Manhattan exceeded them from a musicality standpoint not to mention a truly great feature set to include a digital and analog volume control. I’ve been extremely pleased listening to some DSD recordings on it. Very well built as well with a 6k list price. I think it will be sonically competitive with any dac not priced in the ozone. 

+1 Ayre QX5-20

+1 Mytek Manhattan (II version)

+ 1 @dlcockrum 

Do people even bother to read the original post anymore....

Very cool suggestions, thanks!

I will keep an eye out for a few of these.

As far as those saying rare to find something that will sound like the AN, I tend to agree, but I'm not happy with some of the limitations.  That said, maybe I do need to reconsider, as the sound - the goal of all this in the end - is phenomenal.  It's the epitome of organic, natural, 3-dimensional, etc... all those things we seek.  Maybe I just need to send it in for the USB input and learn to live with 24/96, at least for a while.

I'm using the DirectStream now and have to say it's excellent as well and does many things very well.  Maybe time to get the AN out of storage and do the USB thing and some a/b'ing.  Maybe I can live without Ethernet as well, although I think it's where the future is mostly headed.

I think it's the hobbyist in me that wants to keep finding "newer/better".  It's an illness :)

Get a Singxer SU-1 to feed USB to your audio note.