I’ve heard good things about Epi’s. If you didn’t know, Epiphone is Gibson’s “value” line; assume what you like about that, but I do hear good things from people. I’m told they’re made in China.
I don’t think that guitar looks at all like your current one when you look over the details. Note the different f-hole positions; a real bridge and tailpiece; humbuckers vs your (I presume) single-coils pickups; a toggle pickup switch instead of those hokey flat switches; a smaller and much more attractive pickguard (well, I could do without the ‘e’); better high fret access on the neck; four knobs, a tone/volume for each pickup; Grover tuners, which are old reliables. I have a small personal objection to the plug being on the top instead of the side, but that can be nice if you want to be able to lay the guitar flat in its case and not need to unplug when you do.
Anyway, it looks like a pretty serviceable guitar. Get thee to Guitar Center! Playing it is the way tell if you’ll love it and it’ll love you back.
Here’s a guy playing both a Gibson ES-335 and an “Epiphone Dot”, which I think may be the guitar you’re looking at, but its unclear – Epiphone seems to have several semi-hollows named “dot”.
The Artcore series are also a well-made guitar at a reasonable price, like the Epi Dot. If you like the feel of one over the other, I suspect either would do the job nicely.
I got the Gretsch double cutout hollow-body electric a couple of weeks ago (black – and it has a 125th anniversary label on it) and today will be my third private lesson.
I already like practising so much more. Even when it’s unplugged, which is usually how I practise, the Gretsch sounds pretty good.
I was disappointed to see it didn’t come with an instruction booklet – I guess guitarists don’t need a manual! My teacher went over the various dials and settings, but I didn’t quite catch them, and so I don’t really understand what they do. When I plug it into my amp, I just randomly twirl dials until a sound comes out.
Yeah, so was I – I bought a $1300 Telecaster, and it came with a hardshell case and some marketing & “inspected by” tags strung on the headstock. My $700 Schecter came with even less, not even a case. You’d think for this kind of money, you’d get a paper manual & other tangibles.
FWIW, here are the guitar manuals and other guides (scroll down a bit) on the Gretsch site.