Image forming method and apparatus

An image forming apparatus comprising a photoconductor, a charging roller having a surface roughness of 2-40 μm and disposed for contacting with a surface of said photoconductor to charge said surface, exposing means for exposing imagewise the charged surface of said photoconductor to form an electrostatic latent image thereon, a developing device containing a toner for developing the latent image and to form a toner image on said photoconductor, means for transferring the toner image from said photoconductor to a transfer member, and a fixing device for fixing the transferred image to the transfer member, wherein said toner comprises a colorant, and a binder resin comprising a tetrahydrofuran-soluble component having such a molecular weight distribution that at least one peak having a half width not greater than 15,000 is present between 1,000 and 10,000 when measured by gel permeation chromatography.

A toner for use in an image forming method which comprises charging a surface of a photoconductor by contact with a contact-type charging roller having a surface roughness of 2-40 μm, exposing imagewise the charged surface to form an electrostatic latent image thereon, developing the latent image with said toner, transferring the developed image to a transfer member, and fixing the transferred image,

• said toner comprising a colorant, and a binder resin comprising a tetrahydrofuran-soluble component having such a molecular weight distribution that at least one peak having a half width not greater than 15,000 is present between 1,000 and 10,000 when measured by gel permeation chromatography.