I've heard a few gear drives and personally it would drive me crazy. The quiet ones are still kinda loud. Before you buy anything you might want to listen to someone with the exact gear drive that you want to buy and determine if you want that constant whining noise. I personally think that they just sound like a dying power steering pump and it makes the car sound like there's something wrong with it if you didn't know it had a gear drive. If you get a quality double roller timing chain there's actually less high end friction (more power) and it should last basically around 150,000 miles. I don't know how long gear drives last so i can't comment on that.
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