Patent ID: 8280266

Claim:
An image forming apparatus comprising: an image forming unit including image forming unit elements, wherein the image forming elements include, an image carrier having a surface on which a latent image can be formed, a charging unit configured to receive a charging voltage and to charge the surface of the image carrier, a developer carrier configured to receive a development voltage and to form a developer image by adhering a developer on the latent image formed on the image carrier, and a developer supplier configured to receive a supply voltage and to supply the developer to the developer carrier, a fixing unit configured to fix the transferred developer image formed on a medium which has been transferred from the image carrier to the medium; a voltage setting unit operable, when an unoperated time period, which is a time period from an end of an image forming operation to a start of a subsequent image forming operation, is equal to or greater than a threshold, to set a post unoperated period image formation preparation voltage which is different from a normal image formation voltage, according to the unoperated time period; and a post unoperated period image formation preparation processor operable to perform an idling operation to rotate the image carrier for a predetermined idling time while applying the post unoperated period image formation preparation voltage to a given one or more of the image forming elements, wherein the post unoperated period image formation preparation processor is configured to set different idling time periods based on different unoperated periods.