Korean IPS Monitors and Nvidia under Linux

The business is doing well, so I thought I'd upgrade my computer. Bye bye old laptop plus extra 23" monitor; hello new desktop system, SSD, a meaty Nvidia graphics card and best of all, a pair of awesome Korean 26" IPS monitors. Cool!

Actually, not cool - the displays wouldn't work due to what turned out to be a stupid bug in the Nvidia drivers for Linux. Read on for the story and a solution...