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Shadow spec should definately start with silence - to stop them doing DPS and immediately hit with Mana burns till the mage is out.
Your first goal here is to prevent them from doing DPS ( keep sheild on yourself)
The biggest threat from a mage is there opener it can easily wipe out most of your health - so keep healing/shielding as required, first aim is to get rid of there mana, 2nd aim is to kill them.
A mage without mana is basically a giant carebear.
I probably wouldnt start in shadow form as you will need heals as they do a fair bit of damage. No doubt if they are loosing they will ice you and bolt, mind control them and bring them back to you.
You'll never burn a mage's mana away. They only need about 1.5k of mana to kill you and most have well over 8-9k. Don't forget they've got tricks like evocation and mana gems to fall back on too, and most will have 30-45% mana regen while casting! (damn mage armour, don't forget to dispel this when you get a spare second :) ). It would take 40 - 50 secs just casting mana burn to empty their first bar and win or lose the battle will be over long before then. Their health on the other hand is... crap, it's better to go straight for the kill.
It's important to make sure you keep SW: P on them to stop them sheeping you and bandaging, this is the only heal they've got. Remember you can dispel their snares and frost nova (this is important vs frost mages as their attacks on frozen targets can have 65%+ crit chance). The battle usually comes down to who is quicker on the draw with silence, beware that a mage's counterspell has a 30yd range, as opposed to your 20yd silence so you're at a disadvantage straight away if you start at a distance. Don't let them get range, and try to keep the initiative by charging in and using fear aggressively.
My usual sequence is: Run into silence range (and hope I aren't silenced first), silence, mind blast, run into melee range while casting SW: P, fear, dispel them, flay and mind blast until dead. Use shields as necsasary, don't cast any heals except renew unless they're feared or you're absolutely sure they haven't got counterspell ready, you don't want to get hit with that (10 secs no heals = you dead), the fight won't last long enough for a second fear nine times out of ten though (unless they sheep you, but you've DOT'd em right? So they get no advantage from this ;) )
Shadow priest should win most of the time, it's not the hardest fight, but not a walkover by any means.
Since the honor system came out I think mages have become a lot tougher to overcome. That nasty little trinket you get when you become corporal (Insignia of the Alliance/Horde) has made fearing very difficult as they can now get out of it straight away. I know they can only do it once but fear has a 26-30 second cooldown. Mages, on the other hand, have sheep. They sheep you, you use your insignia and they sheep you again then nuke your ass. Seems fair doesn't it? I experiance this most of the time when fighting mages. Even when there's two of us a clever mage could take both of you.
That's why you have to get in silence first. A mage uses polymorph for two things, to gain the initiative and open up with a huge damage spell, and to bandage himself. Sheeping you after you've already hit him with mindblast and SW: P confers no advantage for him, because he's already lost the initiative (he's already hurt badly) and he can't bandage because of the DOT. It's about who's quickest on the draw.
Versus two players he shouldn't have the initiative anyway. Okay he can sheep one to even the odds, but he can't use sheep to wrest the initiative from you (it's important for mages to get in the first hit, against ranged types anyway, he can kite melee classes all day long of course) and he can't bandage himself or stand still long enough to get off a damaging fireball (or pyro) or frostbolt with someone hitting him (unless he has presence of mind).
Oh, and priests can dispel polymorph from thier friends don't forget.
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