Gear trains are combined with the planetary gear units and helical gear units. It is known that the combination type is decisive to the system performances of the transmissions. In this paper, within the commonly used range of the design requirements for medium and large scaled (1~8 MW) wind turbines, the transmission characteristics of the typical layouts of the gear train are investigated. According to the international standard by ANSI/AGMA/AWEA 6006-A03, the gear boxes are basically designed and compared with respect to the system lifes of 99% reliability, total weight, the power densities, overall diameter/length and the maximum stresses of the gear teeth. With these comparison works, the characteristics of the layouts of gear trains are discussed.