Recommendations on a desktop Linux that has a good track record of up-to-date packages in whatever package manager it uses?

I've been using Ubuntu since ~2009. I've been reasonably happy with it, but I've been encountering more and more instances of needing package version N, but the package manager only caching version N - 2, etc. 

I care less about UI bells and whistles, and much more about up-to-date packages and reliable update schedules (to Ubuntu's credit, the 2 year tick-tock update schedule has been very reliable, just behind the curve).