Mitch4 provides a translation: “The bit of dialogue would mean ‘I was an IBM 700 in a past life’.”
Dirk the Daring sends in this one, appropriate for CIDU:
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More precise: “I was an IBM 704 in a past life.”
IYKYK
To each cliche, there is an equal and opposite cliche:
Absence makes the heart grow fonder.
Out of sight, out of mind.
When the going gets tough, the tough get going.
Don’t keep beating your head against a wall.
and so on.
Jonesy: Or a 701, if you’re old enough :) Or 702, 705, etc. I don’t have a problem with “a 700” though–that was the name of the line, even if there never was an actual machine type of 700.
For the non-IBM-familiar folks: This is more IYKYK stuff! IBM products have a four-digit machine type and three-character model, e.g., 9175-ME1 for one of the current mainframe models. All-numeric model values are also common, so for those of us in states with nnnn-nnn standard license plates, we’ll occasionally see one we “recognize” as a machine we’ve worked on. This applies to ALL IBM hardware, including things like copiers. An early decision someone there made that has always struck me as being very smart: it’s allowed consistent lookups for lo these many years.
I assume that’s the real comics guy Batton Lash in the Crankshaft. Well, technically I assume that character is meant to represent Batton Lash, who died in 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batton_Lash
FWIW, the computer is saying “my” past life, not “a”. But I nitpick.
Comics I Don't Understand 
More precise: “I was an IBM 704 in a past life.”
IYKYK
To each cliche, there is an equal and opposite cliche:
Absence makes the heart grow fonder.
Out of sight, out of mind.
When the going gets tough, the tough get going.
Don’t keep beating your head against a wall.
and so on.
Jonesy: Or a 701, if you’re old enough :) Or 702, 705, etc. I don’t have a problem with “a 700” though–that was the name of the line, even if there never was an actual machine type of 700.
For the non-IBM-familiar folks: This is more IYKYK stuff! IBM products have a four-digit machine type and three-character model, e.g., 9175-ME1 for one of the current mainframe models. All-numeric model values are also common, so for those of us in states with nnnn-nnn standard license plates, we’ll occasionally see one we “recognize” as a machine we’ve worked on. This applies to ALL IBM hardware, including things like copiers. An early decision someone there made that has always struck me as being very smart: it’s allowed consistent lookups for lo these many years.
I assume that’s the real comics guy Batton Lash in the Crankshaft. Well, technically I assume that character is meant to represent Batton Lash, who died in 2019.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batton_Lash
FWIW, the computer is saying “my” past life, not “a”. But I nitpick.