Additional note on allocating memory: The 1.65 in the formula provided below by yaroukh and Karolis is evidently a "fudge factor" arrived at through experimentation. I found that I had to nudge it up a little bit in order to accurately predict the memory that would be needed, otherwise the allocation still failed. In my case, I went right to 1.8 and that has worked so far. Your mileage may vary, so experiment as needed.