How is $O(\log x/\log \log x)$ an upper bound on the number of distinct prime factors of $x$? This is Problem 10.22 in The Nature Of Computation.

Show that any integer $x$ has at most $O(\log x/\log \log x)$ distinct prime factors. Hint: if we list the primes in increasing order, the $i$th prime is at least $i$.

The solution manual argues:

Since the $i$th prime is at least $i$, if $x$ has $d$ distinct factors then $x \geq d!$. Stirling's approximation gives $d! \geq d^d e^{-d}$, so if we pessimistically assume that $x = d!$ we have $\log x = \Theta(d\log d)$ and $\log \log x = \Theta(\log d)$. Then
  $$
d = \Theta\bigg(\frac{\log x}{\log d}\bigg) = \Theta\bigg(\frac{\log x}{\log \log x}\bigg)\,,
$$
  Replacing $\Theta$ with $O$ gives an upper bound that holds when $x \geq d!$.

This deduction doesn't appear fully kosher to me. Since we're interested in an upper bound for $d$ we need the lower bound $\log d \geq \log \log x$ for the central statement to hold. But we don't have such a lower bound. We pessimistically assumed that $x = d!$. In other words, $x \geq d!$. We can turn this into $\log \log x \geq \alpha \log d$ for some constant $\alpha$. But this inequality is pointing in the wrong direction.
 A: I agree that there is a slight problem, but I don't see it at exactly the same place as you. It may also be irritating that it sets $x=d!$ 'pessimisticly', when that is really not necessary and $d!$ can be used at all times until the very end.
The problem is IMO the moment the proof goes from an inequality $d! \ge d^de^{-d}$ to a $\Theta$-statement, that requires inequalities in both directions. To put it bluntly, clearly, $d! \ge 1$, but obviously not $\log (d!) = \Theta(0)$.
Of course, the Stirling approximation provides the necessary accurancy that the inequality lacks:
$$d! \sim \sqrt{2\pi d}\space d^de^{-d}$$
which means (much more but also) there are $c_1,c_2 > 0$ with
$$c_1\sqrt{2\pi d}\space d^de^{-d} \le d! \le c_2\sqrt{2\pi d}\space d^de^{-d},$$
which further imples
$$\log (c_1) + \frac12\log (2\pi) + \frac12\log (d) + d\log d-d \le \log d! \le \log (c_2) + \frac12\log (2\pi) + \frac12\log (d) + d\log d-d,$$
and on both sides the term $d\log d$-term dominates, the remaining terms are just $o(d\log d)$, so we get (as stated in the proof, but not really validated):
$$\log (d!) = \Theta (d\log d).$$
From that follows in the same way the also used:
$$\log \log (d!) = \Theta (\log d),$$
and we finally get 
$$d=\Theta \left({\log (d!) \over \log\log (d!)}\right).$$
Note that this is a statement only about $d$ and $d!$, nothing about the original problem is used here. That statement implies there is a $c>0$ with
$$d \le c{\log (d!) \over \log\log (d!)}$$.
Now, to tackle the original problem, all that is now needed is to see that 
$$d \le c{\log (x) \over \log\log (x)}$$
(with the exact same $c$ as before) is to simply note that $f(x)={\log (x) \over \log\log x}$ is monotincally increasing (for $x \ge e^e$), because $g(y)={y \over \log y}$ is monotonically increasing for $y \ge e$ and remember that $x \ge d!$.
