Is this the Leica look - a couple of my flickr Leica shooting friends:
on Flickr - Photo Sharing!
Girls on Flickr - Photo Sharing!
They do produce less contrasty images as well, but I tried to pick something high contrast and 'sharp' since that's what the example is.
Clean and clear they can look, but at the same time there's someting going on with micro contrast... in the region above the ultimate resolution. A lot of apparent sharpness - and that's not a put-down, it's what we see and sense as 'sharp'.