as a roaster myself, i have to agree with what zellleonhart said here... the term S/O can be misleading especially to those who are not familiar. S/O not necessarily means high quality beans just as blends does not necessarily mean low quality commodity beans. It depends on the treatment, process and how anal the roaster wants to be.. I still hand sort my beans prior and after roasting and i also make sure my supplier knows to give me better quality beans. For that case, i actually don't mind paying a little more premium when they are able to pre-screen my beans. There's a big difference with the brew outcome when using 95% whole beans vs unsorted beans (with high majority of undeveloped / damaged green beans). We were like wtf happened during the roast process even though they are from the same roast batch.. haha

so far i just focus on general use beans ( won't say that they are commodity beans as the prices i'm buying from are definitely not cheap)... I feel higher quality specialty beans such as panama geishas etc would be a waste for now.. haha..