> Why should that be so? I'd expect the all-in cost of a cloud machine to be less than my own hardware
Because cloud hardware doesn't have all the burdens of physically managing a real server. Replacing SSDs. Upgrading RAM. Logging to a iDRAC to restart a crashed server. All those things don't exist in the cloud and make you loose so much operational time. That's why clouds will ALWAYS cost more than bare metal. The cons is that with cloud you keep paying for the same servers: there are no assets anymore, only costs.
Because cloud hardware doesn't have all the burdens of physically managing a real server. Replacing SSDs. Upgrading RAM. Logging to a iDRAC to restart a crashed server. All those things don't exist in the cloud and make you loose so much operational time. That's why clouds will ALWAYS cost more than bare metal. The cons is that with cloud you keep paying for the same servers: there are no assets anymore, only costs.