Sound in CD players started at 44KHz for a good reason, playing samples at a lower frequency adds noise.
Paula works the same way as early digital instruments like the Fairlight or PPG. However, as soon as the technology was cheap enough everyone switched to resampling because the quality was so much better.
Paula is an interesting 80's sound chip but the things that make it good are mainly due to the vast amounts of sound artefacts it produces. This mean it's great if you want a coloured crunchy sound but it's pretty much useless for even normal audio playback these days. Even the most basic PCs have been better for a very long time.
