The exact monetary cost of work time and application downtime (if there even is any, maybe you just shift the load to the second box) varies greatly depending on the context in which the respective project is run (hobby vs. paid-for, I've had both types), which is why I offered time estimates for these costs instead of a monetary amount. The stated monetary amount of "zero" refers to the provider not charging me anything for the new disk itself and the work of changing the disk.

There's common consent that the lowest bar for some hosting to qualify for the "cloud" moniker is that it must abstract from the physical hardware. Most people would even add that it is necessary for some kind of management system to exist which allows for _automated_ provision of your resources.

Renting bare metal instead of owning does not meet this lowest bar. Getting some remote hands service on top with your rental does not change this classification.