As with everything in audio - Yes and No.
It all depends on what you want the DAC to do. I would never buy another DAC that doesn't do native DSD256, which would eliminate the $46,500 dCS Vivaldi Apex from my audition list.
Some manufacturers lobotomize the chip and only use some features, almost all chips upsample internally to some form of DSD, which makes it easier to filter out noise, then convert the signal back to PCM. Only a few DACs are NOS, ANK (Audio Note Kits) and Holoaudio are two that come to mind.
Ted Smith, PS Audio DirectStream’s lead developer, talked about the NOS Philips TDA 1543 chip in the BorderPatrol NOS DAC (and still used in 2022):
“It’s [Philips TDA 1543 DAC] a very simple chip. For people who want NOS or R-2R style DACs it’s great. Also most people don’t seem to read the datasheet, the chip requires an opamp to meet its specs (which aren’t great), but many simply use resistors on its outputs which adds a lot of 2nd harmonic distortion and restricts the dynamic range.
"If your favorite music doesn’t have a lot of high frequencies and it doesn’t get too loud, the chip works well.
"Without an output filter the timing and waveshape of impulses is lost and PRaT will suffer, but if the original recording is already rolled off this won’t be a problem.
I suspect most people that really enjoy orchestral or, say, grunge [or rock] would be disappointed, but jazz trios, women’s solo voice, etc. should sound fine.”
The type of chip used is probably more important on the resale market, with the huge selection of affordable new and used DACs available whether your old obsolete DAC sells will depend on if it has a "good" or "bad" chip. I recently sold a Audio by Van Alstine Fet Valve Hybrid DAC which uses a Wolfson 8742 chip, one of the "good" chips. That AVA DAC still sounded great but after 10 years I wanted to play with oversampling using HQPlayer.
