Buy a server or cloud computing for a new lab? We are starting a new computer lab and expect to have data that is 50-100 TB of text, images, and maybe videos to process. We will need to run tasks occasionally (10-30% utilization per month), so mostly it will be used for storage. Should we go for a server or cloud computing? Some points to consider (I am not expert in hardware): 

Server pros:


Last for years 
Cheaper 


Server cons:


Maintenance, upgrade problems, and other issues are common given that our expert is always busy 


Cloud pros: 


Easier to use (no hassle)


Cloud cons: 


Might be expensive to host large data 
Need to pay for it after 1-2 years (some funds needs to be spent within 1-2 years).
Local servers are likely to be substantially cheaper and also faster to access the data over LAN rather than the internet for data on that scale (just for a quick count from AWS you're looking at $2400 per month if you ignore the deep-storage options that are not appropriate for data in-use; for the same price you could pay for local servers in a couple months with the same capacity).

Given similar choices, the labs I've worked in have always opted for local storage, but we also utilize cloud options for sharing data both for personal use (i.e., having access at work and home) and between other labs. However, this is only a subset of the data, for example data extracted or summarized from raw data.