I don't think partitioning a drive will improve speed. Your still using the same buss. The only reason for a partition is you could say re do the OS C partition and it would not change or delete the content in the DATA partition.
I just re did my DAW last night with a Samsung Evo pro. I used a 250 GB black friday special $100. new egg.
All is up and running smooth again REAL FAST. My old SSD also a Samsung Evo was 3 years old, I think they slow down over time. Anyhow boot time less than 10 seconds now. I didn't realize how bogged down my DAW had become..
And for that reason I believe in a fresh start as apposed to cloning. Cloning is fast but it also brings back all the garbage that gets stashed. To me the speed you gain is worth the time.
I started after dinner last night. By bedtime everything was up and running.
I used my Windows 8.1 disk so no more W10 update blues for me. It took about an hour to finish updating so I was working on my other computer and keeping one eye on things through all this.
First I installed my Scarlett ASIO drivers and disabled all on board audio.
Tweaked a few Windows settings.
I then installed CCC and transferred all my files from my back up drive to the download folder.
This makes installing Sonar and all content go super fast. I think I was done in less than an hour.
Then I dealt with my XLN and Pace installers and installed AD2 and all my Air VST's and Plugs.
I put everything in the new C drive because it will only ever be used for Music.
It's sitting at 80 GB and 36 of that is my Air content.
All my working projects are on a second SSD. Then I have a 1 TB 7200 RPM Data drive for back up and archiving.
This morning I installed Wave Lab, Gold Wave and Nero and the drivers for my Rland A 49 and DTX 450 drums.
That's it, nice clean machine. Ran Sonar for an hour so far and only glitch is I can't remember how to get rid of the start screen. And so far no more NAG screen from XLN.