I'll second the question re: what you feel is missing. But since it doesn't seem that you're being active on this thread, I'll just generalize.
Since the room is always a feature, re-analyze that. In looking at your speaker specs, I'd suggest looking into a sub (relative to the kinds of things you listen to); if doing that, I'd set your speakers to "small" and let the sub take some of that load off them.
Re: a DAC, I recently retired my Node and switched to a separate streamer and DAC (I'd tried the Cambridge, but their oversampling didn't sit well with me). The Anthem looks like a good piece of gear for what it is; not knowing if it would bypass their own DAC, I'd still try analog and digital versions of the same song(s). One issue would be that the Node has a terrible analog output (there's a mod coming out of Poland, but I didn't want to go through the hassle or voiding the warranty), so unless you connect a USB DAC to the Node and feed its analog output to your receiver, you can't really tell. I'd suggest a vendor who'd give you a 30-day return policy (I used a Topping E50 DAC), connect it via USB to your Node and run the analog output into your Anthem, comparing it to the digital output from the Node. It might be that you prefer - possibly definitively - the standalone DAC analog output to the Anthem's DAC.
One more thing to consider is that (apparently) you're running a stereo setup through a multi (-multi!) channel receiver, and there might be other setups that would do much better for you. There are others here who could better recommend a solution relative to your budget, but I'm guessing you could still get a good price for the Anthem (sell or trade) and better tune your receiver to your equipment unless there's a longer-term plan for a surround system; otherwise you're under-utilizing an important part of your system and, relatively speaking, not getting your investment's worth.
