I recently bought my first mandolin (have played guitar for a long time and been around band instruments my whole life) and I decided on the Epiphone MM50E because of the built-in pickup. It's got a sweet tone when played non-electrically, especially with the new strings I just put on it (Bill Monroe mandolin string set from Gibson). And it sounds very nice when plugged into a tube amp (haven't tried it with a solid-state amp yet) -- it sounds more like an acoustic mandolin played into a mic rather than an electric mandolin (the same sort of difference between a mic'ed guitar and an electric guitar). The price is $499.99.

I bought the Epiphone from Sweetwater and even though they claim they do a 55-point evaluation/setup on it, the bridge was way in the wrong place so the octaves weren't close to being in tune. A little adjustment on my part with my ears and with an electronic tuner to be certain of the bridge placement, and the mandolin plays very nicely now.