Recommend A New DAC Between $1000 and $2000

My path so far has been from the built-in DAC in the Bluesound Node 2i, to the Schiit Modi Multibit, and now to the Denafrips Pontus II, which is in the price range you specified. I am sure I will get the itch to upgrade at some point, but right now I am quite satisfied with the Pontus II. Because it sounds slightly different depending on which input you use, I opted for sending the USB output from my streamer to a Denafrips Gaia DDC to be able to drive the Pontus via its I2S.

I'm considering getting a streamer that natively supports I2S, like Magna's Manus mkIII or the new Mercury V2, eliminating the USB to I2S conversion. If anyone has experience with these or similar, I'd welcome feedback. 

I still use a Theta DS Pro Gen V and recently added a Topping D90-SE for my streamer.  Not surprisingly the Topping sounds better (to me anyway) than my now very old Theta. $899

Khadas Tone Pro 2! $230 and including a headphone output!

+1 for the Denafrips Pontus II. I’m very happy with mine and at about $1800 USD it’s within your budget.

I tweak  everything I own for Decades to get the most out of it 

the New Gustard R2R26  is a excellent dac , theway the circuitry is situated 

a very good fuse makes a very big difference in this dac I own both the pontus 2 

and theGustard , the pontus no fuse option , I put the Synergistic research purple 

in there , and in all dacs a good powercord is a must ,the Pangea awg14 sig mk2

with Cardas wire is very respectable for $200. The pontus is a bit smoother on top - laid back , thegustard with the purple fuse is better in the bass more depth and detail ,it’s a bit better rounded dac ,if you are willing to spend the extra ,have a decent powercord for any good dac , and either the synergistic purple fuse 

or even better the QSA purple fuse but that is $330 vs $200 and give these fuses 200+ hours.  Our Audio get together had them both for the  day  70% took the Gustard setup as I described.