I cannot confirm this. I have Pro and get the same Popups and shortcuts to Candy Crush etc. They usually get installed during your first setup.

Yeah, it takes me about 20 mins to de-crappify windows 10, and then I get this.. https://imgur.com/a/SaphU

Which is what I mean.

The app stores links are as much ads as bundling software in the old days.

Bundling Software was not part of clean installs with ISOs from Microsoft. Now they are.

This is why I'm resistant to dual boot my workstation. I 'just' want Windows 7 with security updates.

Does Candy Crush not come back for you? It always did for me.

It hasn't so far.

So Candy Crush and Facebook popping up in your Start Menu are not ads?

I have never seen them, beyond the first install, just like bundled software used to be.

Bundled software is not an ad, it is already there.

I also haven't seem them, but I think they were removed by this tool: https://www.winprivacy.de/english-home/ (PLEASE, please check before downloading, I installed it a year ago or more, back then it was ok, I can't guarantee how it's now).

This disables a lot of tracking, but I assume, also disables ads. (I've seen only 1 ad, and that was for the OneDrive in explorer).

Pro has the same ads as Home.