The 303 example in the environments in which I learned computer music fundamentals (PD, Max, CSound, Supercollider) would require either much more or less understanding and/or 3rd party implementations of components to generate something similar. Most importantly the sound is really nice.
Btw the categorisation of it being a DAW is dependent on the user perspective, I've created what I would consider to be DAW equivalents in Max/Pure Data, that facilitate audio/midi recording and playback; just because a toolkit doesn't do stuff for you automatically doesn't mean it isn't capable. DAW in my opinion is just a marketing term not a descriptive one.