Maybe (surely ??) I'm wrong , but if you look at the NVidia's linux drivers (Linux Graphics Driver Download @ NVidia.com), you can see that the release is undernamed 29.60:
"Version: 1.0-2960
Release Date: 5/23/2002"

As the incoming Windows' drivers are the 29.42 ones, does someone could explain this ?? Is the linux release completly different or what ?
Are the nvidia drivers really "unified" or not ?

They are unified in the sense that one driver download provides support for their entire lineup of chips. However, you are still required to download a separate package for different operating systems. Just like there is one for 9x/Me and Win2k/XP, there is one for linux. and I believe the version numbering does not at all correspond with the windows version numbers.

The version numbers dont correspond at all, in fact the Linux drivers are built and maintained by a team that's mostly seperate from the windows driver team within Nvidia.

It's nice to see some companies supporting Linux a bit more, too many still spend all day sucking up to M$ and trying not to get on thier bad side by making other OS drivers.

Thanks for the explanations 8)
BTW, it's good to see that both ATI and NVidia are working to make their hardware usable with linux !!