I did some searching, and it seems that Benfotiamine might not be as useful for preventing AGE's in the brain. It was said that the allithiamines, sulbutiamine and fursultiamine, would be better in that regard. I'm a little leery of using sulbutiamine or fursultiamine. Would plain old thiamine be a decent substitute, say 50mg daily?
I would say thiamine is not absorbed as easily, TTFD (aka fursultiamine aka allithiamine) is much more active.
Sulbutiamine is the nootropic which causes negative side effects.
TTFD actually works pretty well.
You'll need larger doses of thiamine if you want the same effect.
Plus, I believe thiamine doesn't work if you have a transketolase deficiency.