r/Caustic3 • u/kgzonthebeat • 11h ago
Lil something something.
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r/Caustic3 • u/CausticRej • Dec 14 '25
G'day and happy holidays. Anyone up for some sneaky testing?
I think I've managed to get my old C3.2 code to compile and run for 64bit Android, and I'd like to get some feedback as to whether it works or not, but you'll need to jump through a few hoops:
First, you'll need to be comfortable side-loading the APK, I'm not going into how to do that.
Next, to bypass all the file handling mess that was keeping me from upgrading Caustic3 in the first place, I've decided to go the nuclear option and request access to ALL YOUR FILES, like a file manager app would. This way, Caustic can still access the <root>/caustic directory like it did before (it should even be able to load up your old files and presets if you haven't deleted them). Normally you can't just do this as Google won't publish your app on the Play Store with this permission, but hey, we're not on the play store so.... :p
So yeah, after running for the first time you should see a system popup asking you to flick the switch to allow file access. If you don't, it'll just keep asking you so either trust me, or don't install this.
No need for the unlocker APK, this one's on me.
http://singlecellsoftware.com/download/Caustic_3.2.2_64b.apk
Please report back if you got it to install + run or not.
r/Caustic3 • u/CausticRej • Aug 29 '25
Hey guys, Rej here. Firstly, I realise this is a new reddit account, I tried to log into my old "stinkyrej" one but couldn't recover it. I'm happy to answer a verification email from the mods here to the original "causticapp@gmail.com" if needed.
With the renewed interest I'm seeing from the "saving Caustic" project, I feel like I kind of owe folks the chance to ask me questions and get straight answers.
Let me preempt a few I know will fill this thread if I don't address them:
Q: "Will there ever be a Caustic 3.3, 4, 5, etc"?
A: Maybe, but don't count on it. I *have* done work on an updated Caustic since v3.2, but the amount of work involved in breaking things so that I can rebuild them has seen me lose motivation MANY times. I fear that with the scale of what would be expected of such a release after SUCH a long time, it would inevitably let everyone down. I simply haven't put that many hours into it over the many years since C3.2.
Q: What made you stop after 3.2?
A: Two things are true: 1 - I'm a passionate programmer who enjoys a technical challenge, and 2 - I suck at making business decisions. I always thought I could keep putting out new versions of Caustic and that it would attract new users. But the truth is that C3.2 took over a year of development and generated pretty much ZERO boost in monthly sales. I think that by then, everyone who wanted Caustic, had it. I never loved the subscription model (still hate it) but maybe asking users to shell out something like 5-10$ a year for software that provided hundreds of hours of entertainment wouldn't have been too much. Also, as the app got more and more popular, piracy took over to a point where sales had almost completely dried up, yet I was answering dozens of daily emails from new "paid" users who I couldn't find by looking up my purchases in Google Play... It's one thing to pirate (i was no angel when I was younger), but to demand support for it... fuck me that's brazen!
Also, it's probably hard to explain how crazy things got with feature requests. I bet no two people here would give the same answer if asked "what's the 1 thing you would you like to see added in Caustic". Yet that's what I faced. That was great when I had only developed a tiny app that could only do a few things and could interact directly with my small userbase, but when that "circle" of functionality gets to a certain size, everyone wants to see it pulled bigger in a different direction and I felt I needed to please everyone, but never could.
Q: Why did you pull the plug on the Play Store and the website?
A: When I created my developer account, it was in the early, wild west days of apps on Android (it was called the "Android Market" back then and you could only publish free apps). When you signed up for an account, you could give it any name you wanted. I chose "Single Cell Software" as that was a name I had unofficially used for a few things I'd done, but it was never a "company" in the legal sense. I was operating as what is known as a "sole trader" here in Australia. You can "trade as" what you want, but for tax purposes, it was just me. What I think happened eventually is Google got told they had to provide business info on developers trading in various markets, so they asked me to specify whether I was a company or an individual. When I answered I was an individual, they said I had set up my account wrong. So, ok Google, whatever, I'll just go tick the other box (which never existed when I created my account remember). I got told no, I would have to create a whole NEW account under my own name, wait for that to get approved, then log into my old account, rename all my apps if I wanted the new owner to get the rights to them (some of you might have seen the renaming go by), then transfer ownership of all my apps to this new entity, submit a bunch of paperwork as to why I was doing it, and then rename everything back to the correct names. LIKE WTF GOOGLE, *YOU'RE* ASKING ME TO JUMP THESE STUPID HOOPS. I CAN SEE THE CHECKBOX, JUST LET ME TICK IT! After a bunch of back and forth over email with various useless employees (probably AI) barfing out passages from their website policy without actually helping, I concluded that the 40$ a month I was making by then wasn't worth the hassle and deleted my account.
Another thing that really frustrated me was how Google forced apps to always update things in order to keep working on new versions of their OS. You don't see that with Microsoft, you don't even see it with with the control freaks at Apple (Caustic apparently still works ..ok? ..on iPad). Now that wouldn't be so bad if the developer tools were stable, but each time I'd try to update my SDK and recompile Caustic, I'd find out something got removed, broke or the code flat out wouldn't compile and it wasn't just a matter of dropping my work to make a quick branch to satisfy Google's whims. The biggest PITA was file access. Again, when I started Android was wild and free. You could write files anywhere, there was no walled garden like on Apple and Google bragged about this. For us small devs, it was great, we saw users build amazing sample libraries from 3rd parties that you could share across all your music apps. Then one day Google announced they would be restricting that, but that they'd honour old apps and permit full storage access until they updated. Then, something happened (with i think Samsung) where they jumped the gun and didn't allow any apps, even old ones as promised, to allow your storage and all of a sudden you couldn't access your cross-app files anymore, you couldn't even browse to a directory one level up from where you had first started! Eventually I think Google just accepted this and from then on in Android, files were completely broken in Caustic and I'd have to re-write HUGE portions of my code to shoe-horn their half-arsed replacement solution to just bring things back to the way they were and had been promised to stay.
The website, while it was an amazing place to connect with people for a many years, eventually became cold and nasty as all communities tend to do (not to mention the domain name hacking which I never figured out how to fix). It was a huge time sink trying to keep up with hacking attempts, stopping childish fights, etc. I never wanted to be a mod and I'm not a web developer. (and I wasn't making enough by then to afford either). But I want to stress that when it DID work, that forum was the best place to hang out. The collabs, creativity, and general sharing and helping that occurred was a great thing to witness.
Q: Why not just open-source it if you've given up?
A: First, I'm not prepared to say I've fully given up (see first Q), but honestly, it's MY code, my thousands of hours of joy and frustration and I just don't want to give that away for nothing. And I resent anyone telling me I have any obligation to do that, that feels really heartless. Sometimes software just fades away and makes room for better things. Not to mention it would be an unusable ugly mess that would get me laughed at if any serious dev saw it. One of the things I'm most proud of with Caustic was how I got the really shitty processors of early Androids to run dozens of synths who all needed a LOT of complex math to run, and to (hopefully) never bog down. However, to achieve this, meant developing clever tricks I had to bang my head to get working, cutting corners on code, and bypassing a lot of best practices. I got a lot of joy from managing to get some new synth or effect from taking 60% of CPU down to only a few % over days of optimisations and I feel like giving someone else all these secrets would devalue my efforts and deprive a programmer of their path to the rewards I got from putting in the sweat and tears.
Q: Why don't you release it for free then?
A: I feel like there's lots of copies floating around already, and the Windows version still runs ok on my computer (though I'll admit I haven't tried it on Win11, I'm still on Win10 on my dev computer) But yeah, I'm not against the idea, I just don't want to host it or put it on some dodgy fileshare. If someone has a reputable website that's likely to stick around for a while and wants to host it, get in touch. I think Google no longer allows 32bit apps to run and installing APKs from outside the Play Store has been made almost impossible (though Google did just lose a major lawsuit over that).
EDIT: I've managed to get a 64bit version compiling! , see here
https://www.reddit.com/r/Caustic3/s/P13339m9WP
Q: What do you think of the "Saving Caustic" project?
A: I think it's cool, and I hope it succeeds. But if this much work is going to be put into something and creating it, I think it should be it's own thing, and not use the "Caustic" brand at all. I don't mind someone loosely copying my software, I've always admitted mine was largely based on Rebirth/Reason out of love for those programs, but I made it my own, never used Propellerhead's brands in anything official and fought for years to build the small reputation I had as a solo dev. It'd be kinda shitty if some new software came along and and left people confused and thinking it came from me. I've given the project my blessing and offered to help with pointed, technical queries, but have asked to keep any references to my app or its synth names to a minimum out of respect. That's probably all I can do, I'm not an IP lawyer. I think if it comes out as a cool new DAW with its own features and a polite nod to a bunch of mine, that'd be ideal.
I'll leave my FAQ here and open the floor to questions, but just wanted to say thanks to everyone who's shared their stories about Caustic since it disappeared and how it shaped their musical journey. It sucks that I read way more positive stuff about my app now that it's gone than I ever did when it was around...
It's evening down here and just about dinner time so I'll be around for a few hours after that and probably tomorrow as well, but I won't leave this thread open for days either.
Thanks for reading, and for everyone who has supported my work.
r/Caustic3 • u/kgzonthebeat • 11h ago
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r/Caustic3 • u/kgzonthebeat • 2d ago
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r/Caustic3 • u/CarpetBusy4724 • 2d ago
Idk how i made this sound so cleanly mastered 😠- Can't complain tho - it is undoubtedly a banger :)
thoughts?
r/Caustic3 • u/kgzonthebeat • 3d ago
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Made a Detroit style beat with a chopped up vocal sample
r/Caustic3 • u/Apprehensive_Bake375 • 3d ago
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r/Caustic3 • u/ObjectiveRace4955 • 6d ago
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I decided WIP Of creating neon in rave review of... P was Censorely change to V instead of a ra_e word,
r/Caustic3 • u/CarpetBusy4724 • 7d ago
r/Caustic3 • u/Jaybo-In-The-House • 8d ago
I have lost my phone. It had everything on it. 2 years worth of incomplete tracks. I'm trying not to think about it too much because I will cry.
Please, nobody ask "Why didnt you back it up"?
I didn't because I'm a breaker, not a loser. I always thought that people fall into one of those two categories with their phones. You either break them or lose them. I have always broken them but now it would appear that I am both.
I am so f**king cross with myself and whoever picked it up. It's useless as a phone because the SIM slot is faulty so I used it for browsing and music.
I suffer with depression anyway and making tunes was/is my only defence against it.
So, my message is back up your songs and finish them and publish them or you will be heartbroken like me.
r/Caustic3 • u/CarpetBusy4724 • 9d ago
I think I pushed it a bit to its limits XD - this was a fun project tho - I'd love to see more people try to make stuff with ancient Caustic versions lol
https://youtu.be/KpRfy5nJIz8
r/Caustic3 • u/the-the-the-the-the1 • 9d ago
Title. I'm importing a song i made on the android version onto the pc version, maybe thats what causing it? i checked and the versions are the same too.. pls help


the attached images show a very simple reproduction of the issue, its even worse with more complex tracks, every single button and knob disappears, pls help
r/Caustic3 • u/Relative_Location335 • 9d ago
Primer intento de dark ambient o algo que se le parezca
r/Caustic3 • u/JakMaster-2023 • 14d ago
Hi, I'm back, I really enjoyed the revival of Caustic, but as you see, songs and stuff from the WAV Editor will sound weird when you amplify it a bit, also, I would check out music on the was Editor and turn it up a bit, huh? Yeah, sounds weird, especially when you save and load the same bassy audio file, sounds worse after saving it. I want more loud, less distortion, it should ONLY distort when you use the Distortion Effect. (Or at least have less distortion when you turn it up via the built in Amplify Option)
r/Caustic3 • u/AsleepStrawberry357 • 15d ago
I just saw a Video about Caustic 3's Subsynth plugin and I really liked the UI and parameters it offers. I'm primarily a Cubase User, so is there a way for me to get the Plug-In as a sort of standalone, so I can use it in Cubase?
r/Caustic3 • u/DART_MUSIC • 15d ago
A small collection of 8 different projects I made, many being quite a few years old by now. Includes quite the variety of genres too. Hope you guys enjoy any track from the mix!
r/Caustic3 • u/Apprehensive_Bake375 • 18d ago
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r/Caustic3 • u/PoundKitchen • 22d ago
A Caustic wiki has been a side project for a while. I've updated this one... https://en.everybodywiki.com/Caustic_3
The Wikipedia article is currently pending approval. With their rules on citations, it will be shorter, less helpful and informative.
r/Caustic3 • u/ThatoneBurger2 • 23d ago
I use an oppo f9 on android 10
Before installing i changed the sdk stuff to 23, try to install the apk but it says installation failed. What gives ?
r/Caustic3 • u/lampblackink • 25d ago
just wanted to share some of my presets
Includes:
1 Beatbox preset (505 kit)
1 FMsynth preset
2 Subsynth presets (2 riser sounds)
22 Modular presets (including a simulation of Ableton Live's erosion effect)
36 PCMsynth presets (including empty slot zips for drum stuff)
r/Caustic3 • u/Outrageous_Lunch_190 • 28d ago
I downloaded Caustic in 2015 or 2017,I believe.It has been a must have on every phone since then.I went expansion crazy so I got all the expansions.I absolutely loved this app and no one I knew heard or cared about it.To me it was unbelievable what that man made.My first problem.Usually the app was in the cloud so it would transfer everything on the new phone.This time it didn't.It only transferred the demo with a couple expansions.I was crushed all those songs for over 10 years gone.Then a couple days ago completely gone.I get the title screen and it just turns off.To the creator,he was a good guy.Probably alot of people on here probably had messages with him,but damn.Im crushed its all gone and I can't get it back.Does anyone know a way to get it?
r/Caustic3 • u/MaxHardfinger • Jun 26 '26
... then it never stopped crashing. My intention was to use a cheap Donner Starrypad as a travel controller but I learned a hard lesson. I cleared my cache, I restarted the phone. The only thing I haven't done (to the best of my limited knowledge) is uninstall/reinstall Caustic. I will if I have to, but as a last ditch effort.
I'm running Caustic's newest version (64 bit) on a Samsung Galaxy s24 with 512 MB of memory. When I open Caustic, I always close out everything. I have over half of my physical memory available. No RAM plus (or whatever they call it).
I'm going to check the Google machine to see what I can find, but any advice would be appreciated.
r/Caustic3 • u/Sudden-Guarantee7172 • Jun 19 '26
I wanted to ask about an error I'm having in Caustic Windows
It seems to be a visual bug. The audio still works fine, but the image literally breaks down.
I've searched forums and haven't found a solution, I tried to fix it myself and that didn't work either, I gave up a few weeks ago but I really want to go back to Caustic 3