Any recommendations for a (mATX) motherboard that has 6x SATA ports and 1x M2 that isn't ruinously expensive? Lots have that combination but using the M2 disables a couple of the SATA ports (which is generally in the small print in the specs somewhere).
Have you already excluded the option of a PCIe card with a bunch of SATA ports on it? If you have the slot and the space, that looks like a cheap way to solve your problem
Any recommendations for a (mATX) motherboard that has 6x SATA ports and 1x M2 that isn't ruinously expensive? Lots have that combination but using the M2 disables a couple of the SATA ports (which is generally in the small print in the specs somewhere).