Agreed.  How does one acquire the latest?  It's very confusing where things come from.

System >> Administration >> Hardware Drivers
 * Shows that nvidia proprietary driver is in use. OK. (which version?? ... useless)

Actually running nvidia-settings shows:
 * Version = 96.43.13

Running Ubuntu 9.10:
{{{
$ dpkg --list | grep nvidia-settings
ii  nvidia-settings                       256.29-0ubuntu1~nvidiavdpauppa1                        Tool of configuring the NVIDIA graphics driv
rc  nvidia-settings-190                   190.42-0ubuntu1~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa1                 Tool of configuring the NVIDIA graphics driv
}}}

{{{
$ dpkg --list | grep nvidia
ii  libvdpau1                             0.4-2~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa4                           Video Decode and Presentation API for Unix (
ii  libxine1                              1.1.16.3-vdpau-0ubuntu2~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa1         the xine video/media player library, meta-pa
ii  libxine1-bin                          1.1.16.3-vdpau-0ubuntu2~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa1         the xine video/media player library, binary 
ii  libxine1-console                      1.1.16.3-vdpau-0ubuntu2~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa1         libaa/libcaca/framebuffer/directfb related p
ii  libxine1-ffmpeg                       1.1.16.3-vdpau-0ubuntu2~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa1         MPEG-related plugins for libxine1
ii  libxine1-misc-plugins                 1.1.16.3-vdpau-0ubuntu2~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa1         Input, audio output and post plugins for lib
ii  libxine1-x                            1.1.16.3-vdpau-0ubuntu2~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa1         X desktop video output plugins for libxine1
ii  mplayer                               2:1.0~rc3+svn20091207-0ubuntu1~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa11 movie player for Unix-like systems
ii  mplayer-nogui                         2:1.0~rc3+svn20091207-0ubuntu1~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa11 movie player for Unix-like systems
ii  nvidia-173-modaliases                 173.14.20-0ubuntu5                                     Modaliases for the NVIDIA binary X.Org drive
rc  nvidia-190-libvdpau                   190.42-0ubuntu1~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa4                 Video Decode and Presentation API for Unix
ii  nvidia-190-modaliases                 190.53-0ubuntu1~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa14                Modaliases for the NVIDIA binary X.Org drive
ii  nvidia-96-kernel-source               96.43.13-0ubuntu6                                      NVIDIA binary kernel module source
ii  nvidia-96-modaliases                  96.43.13-0ubuntu6                                      Modaliases for the NVIDIA binary X.Org drive
rc  nvidia-common                         0.2.15.1-1~nvidiavdpauppa1                             Find obsolete NVIDIA drivers
rc  nvidia-glx-190                        190.53-0ubuntu1~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa14                NVIDIA binary Xorg driver
ii  nvidia-glx-96                         96.43.13-0ubuntu6                                      NVIDIA binary Xorg driver
ii  nvidia-settings                       256.29-0ubuntu1~nvidiavdpauppa1                        Tool of configuring the NVIDIA graphics driv
rc  nvidia-settings-190                   190.42-0ubuntu1~karmic~nvidiavdpauppa1                 Tool of configuring the NVIDIA graphics driv
}}}

This is how (I believe) the nvidia drivers are acquired:
{{{
$ pwd
/etc/apt/sources.list.d
$ cat nvidia-vdpau-ppa-karmic.list 
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/nvidia-vdpau/ppa/ubuntu karmic main
}}}